Destiny 2 Is Not In A Good Place, Says Analyst, Following Microtransaction Controversies

January 24th, 2018 Connor

It feels like we can’t go more than a week or so without Bungie being forced to apologize to its community for another dumpster fire of a PR decision, with the promise that they will listen closer moving forward. With each apology centered around either a hard-to-overlook bout of poor design or perceptibly underhanded attempt to cripple game progression to bring player attention to the real money Eververse, it may not be surprising that players starting to turn away from Destiny 2 and Bungie’s investors are taking notice.

In a note to investors titled “Destiny is Not in a Good Place,” Doug Creutz of analyst firm Cowen points to Destiny 2 appearing to have a problem keeping its players engaged, with issues surrounding microtransactions and Bungie’s poor communication and response to criticism being at the forefront of his concerns. Creutz also focuses on Destiny 2 Twitch viewership when discussing player engagement, stating that franchise view counts are at an all time low. Destiny 2 is apparently bringing in 4,000-7,000 views on a Friday afternoon compared to 14,000-17,000 from Destiny 1 a year ago.

Cruetz also believes that Destiny 2 may have a much harder time turning itself around than Destiny 1 did, owing to a more competitive market.

“We do think Bungie still has some opportunity to fix the game’s problems over the next year and recapture engagement, but we’re not sure they have the ability to pull it off at this point. We also note that Destiny currently has more serious competition in its genre from a refurbished Division (Ubisoft) and the indie title Warframe than it did three years ago, when D1 had its own share of player dissatisfaction.”